183. American Faith

Religion in America, like everywhere, can get a little complicated. In spite of that, I appreciate the ways of faith in America. There is no doubt that people use religion to manipulate others, but the over riding nature of individualism in America and the fervent belief in separation of church and state keeps faith, as it should be, a very personal thing. I find that encouraging and I find it remarkable. Part of it is that something so individualistic as faith, whether it be Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism or the myriads of other faiths continue through the barrage of the mob mentality that is only human and part of the secularized modern world.

Personally, I am Christian and my own faith is in the grace of God toward an undeserving humanity, a grace and forgiveness that I believe in sharing and extending to others no matter what. I know that the tenets of my faith are those written of in the bible, particularly the New Testament, but that Christianity in America can get really complicated by a list of what to do and what not to do. I’ve fallen into that trap from time to time as well. Generally, I think it is an attitude of service toward the good of mankind and through Christians that the grace of God is extended, not a prescribed list (nor is it only Christians who can extend the grace of God).

It is my faith that spurs me forward and protects me from despair. I have hope and that is definitely a part—if not the whole—of my American optimism that others may view as naïveté. I share this faith with millions of others in my country, though every single one of us might interpret it slightly differently in very individualistic American terms of how we live out that faith. I know it gets debated in the halls of Congress on a regular basis, even while being disguised as something else like health and safety and responsibility and the ever-certain taxation of the masses. I won’t deny that I find many American Christians stuck in that battle for the entire existence of our experiment. But while I may sometimes deride a false Christianity, I have no doubt that our wrestling these questions is necessary. My very existence is predicated upon my faith in God and my hope lies in this faith that was given to me in America and so many other faiths have also been granted here. I am grateful for this. 

My sermon for the second Sunday of Easter

 

Acts 4:32-35

I John 1-2:2

John 20:19-31

Psalm 133

I never know how to start a sermon. I don’t mean the talking part, but the preparation. I have read guides on what to do and tried to follow them, but usually that doesn’t work for me. I am okay with public speaking, and writing essays, but sermons are a slightly different creature because they require a lot of work in research, close reading, and a little confession. Working on today’s sermon was no different. This time when Suzanne asked me if I could preach sometime in April I said okay and then picked a Sunday that I thought I could do and confirmed it. And then I read the lectionary scriptures for today, and like always, I noticed a distinct theme. Every single one of them today has to do with unity except for the Gospel. Or is the Gospel reading also about unity? I doubted it. Today’s Gospel is about doubt. I doubted I could use all of those scriptures in a singly themed sermon, but decided that was ok. I could just pick the Gospel and preach about doubt. Then I doubted I could get enough material to talk for more than a couple of minutes about doubting the resurrection because typically I don’t have doubts about that. But then, not having doubts about things makes me a little smug, and that’s never a good thing. So, I have decided that maybe I should talk about doubt and I decided that perhaps doubt is, in fact, a unifying structure for the church, for us.

            What isn’t in the gospel reading is the first part of John chapter 20. Thomas has always been given the added nickname, Doubting. It seems derisive, like we are aghast that Thomas would dare to doubt the other disciples. But earlier in the chapter it is evident that every single one of them doubted it. When Peter and John came to the tomb and saw it empty, they didn’t hit their foreheads and say, “Duh, he’s not here because he’s resurrected,” though they should have. Instead they immediately jumped to the conclusion that someone had stolen the body. They were all so convinced of this that Mary didn’t even seemed shocked to see angels, she just complained to them about Jesus being taken and when she saw Jesus she thought he was the gardener. They were all filled with doubt and they had to experience Jesus resurrection more fully than just a couple of angels and an empty tomb, they had to see him, and even that, of itself, was not enough. They had to interact with him. I believe Thomas’ nickname is unjust. He just spoke to what they all felt and had already experienced. Verse 25: “Unless I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe.”

            I think the key for us is to note what Jesus did, more than Thomas’ doubt—he only doubted, he did not refute the possibility of resurrection, and that’s also important to note—Jesus, in verse 27 “said to Thomas, ‘Put your finger here; see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe.’” And verse 28, Thomas said to him, “My Lord and my God!” He did stop doubting and he believed. And, like always, Jesus showed him grace and let Thomas touch his wounds.

            It is a huge detriment to us, as Christians, to become smug, to label others as Doubting Thomases because then we forget our own doubts. And we all have doubts. There is nothing wrong with doubt because it is a simple questioning and only by questioning and looking for the answers can you really have belief. If you read something you should be asking questions. When you listen to others in conversation, you should be asking questions. Not that every question needs to be one of doubt, but if there is doubt the only way to bring clarity is to question. Thomas had his doubts and Jesus gave him clarity. Jesus gave Thomas grace, Jesus gives us all grace.

In verse 29 Jesus blessed those who have not seen and yet still believe and every Christian in our time believes in that blessing, but I would also venture to say that most of us have a story that reveals something substantial, that causes us to believe or confirms our belief. But even the most ardent believers have moments like Mary where we see the obvious facts right before our faces (Jesus was right there) and we mistake them for something else, for the gardener. Jesus brought the clarity to Martha just by saying her name. While the resurrection may seem complicated, the grace of God is not. He simply said Martha and she knew.

            John states his purpose in writing the gospel and his letter: Verse “30 Jesus performed many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not recorded in this book. 31 But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.” And I John 1:1-4: “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of life. 2 The life appeared; we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us. 3 We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. 4 We write this to make our joy complete.” John wrote frequently to answer the question to our doubts, “to make our joy complete,” to unify our common purpose of a full, joyful, complete, eternal life. His entire gospel and epistles were to affirm the complete joy, to counter doubts, not deride us for having them. Jesus brings the clarity, and in our case, he brought it through the writings of John. (I know there is debate on whether or not the same John wrote all of those works, but it really doesn’t matter in regard to doubt or faith or grace if these two works are the same writer or not. My bias says they are the same writer because of all the light and word stuff in the John works…)

            It is important to note that we all have doubts about a zillion things, but definitely our faith. I don’t think that is a weakness, but the nature of our humanity, a questioning nature. There is no doubt that that can, and frequently does, get us into trouble, but it also strengthens us because we are able to question and to seek. And we should always seek answers, and we should never present false platitudes as answers. What I mean by this is that we should not expect others to believe things just because we do, we have to explain why we believe what we do. Saying, “The bible says it and I believe it,” is not helpful for a non-believer so you aren’t being much of a witness. That’s just being smug. Why do you believe the witness of the bible? Why do you believe in the resurrection? Those are the questions we must return to frequently to actually be of any use to others or ourselves. Faith requires some thought. And faith also accepts grace, it isn’t our place to be the smug know it all. Jesus appeared to those disciples and John very specifically shared it with us by writing it down. I realize that people in the ancient world had different experiences and might have explained things differently than we do now, but they did not believe people were put to death and then just rose from the dead three days later any more than we do today. Why else do you think Thomas said he wouldn’t believe it until he saw the nail prints and touched the wounds? The grace of Jesus comes when he lets us see for ourselves. I have no reason to believe John was making up an elaborate story, and I certainly believe in miracles because I’ve experienced them, and there are plenty of miracles that we often write off because we can explain them like the sunrise, or the return of daffodils every spring. I am not one who has to doubt the miracle of the resurrection, but I do believe that I need to be gracious to those like Thomas or Mary, or Peter and John, for that matter. What I am saying is that as Christians we need to be unified in our belief in the resurrection and be gracious to those who might doubt it. We don’t need to be smug about our faith, we need to be thoughtful about it. The church has presented a lot of infighting about trivial pursuits from whether to have musical instruments in church or whether or not we should drink wine or grape juice during communion. None of that is evidence of the faith we have in the resurrection, and it doesn’t offer grace to our brothers and sisters who have doubts. It only feeds the doubt.

            But I did say we need to be thoughtful about our faith. We do need to consider those trivial pursuits, but they are not what we present to those who need to see and feel the resurrected body of our savior. First things first: we believe in the resurrection of the dead and we believe this because of the resurrection of Jesus along with all denominations of Christianity. We must be unified in this belief and take care of those who are doubting. In Acts the early Christians pooled their resources, even sold their houses to distribute to those who had need. That kind of grace is what Jesus was showing Thomas when he told him to put his hands in the nail prints and to stop doubting and believe.

The hard part about a sermon for me is that I want to tell you what I believe about the scripture I am preaching on. I want to share my belief, but the difficulty for me this last year has been that I haven’t had the usual opportunities to do what I have always done. I have not minded retirement because it is nice not to always feel the nagging burden of work, but the way I have always shared my faith has been through my work as a teacher. I developed relationships with students, parents and teachers. I experienced times of need and I did what I could to offer that grace I have received through the forms of help that I have been gifted with, namely teaching and building relationships through that job. Most all of that has been stripped away through retirement and the typical ways I could have replaced it have been put on hold because of the pandemic. I haven’t even put a tie on in over a year (not that that has anything to do with my faith…). This year has proven to be difficult for everyone for very different reasons. I’m grateful that I have the means to no longer have to work, I’m not hungry, or without shelter. And this year one could easily feel guilty about that, because even that was stripped from many people. Even church has been spotty because the human connections have been less frequent. What I’m telling you is that there is always room for doubt about something, namely safety and protection, and people often rely on that more than they think. When those things are removed, faith can get shaky. More than ever we need to be unified as agents of Christ’s grace. For me that’s causing me to search my tool kit for how to do that. Certainly, standing up here presenting the gospel helps, but only in part. I’m telling you this because I know I am not alone in these feelings, even if I am newly retired. We have all been isolated in one way or another and some of us can deal with that better than others.

I have not made my typical three strong points this time. Instead I have put forth one very strong point in being graceful to doubt, to the doubt of others and to our own doubt. None of us here have probably been too shaken in our faith, but we have seen where the seeds of doubt come from. We hold our faith together by coming together to worship and fellowship and pray and just see each other. The early disciples went through a very dark three days of intense grief but by the power and grace of the resurrection they were able to get it together enough to pool their resources and take care of people in need. We too, have been through a pretty dark time and it’s certainly not over. Well over half a million people have died in our country alone, not to mention the rest of the world. So, we need to be gracious, not only through pooling our resources, but by being unified in our belief in the resurrection, by helping the doubters and being merciful in any way we can. This is the time to be gracious and aware of the difficulty that we are all facing with the economy, work, and isolation. Sometimes that might just be to stop and say someone’s name, to talk to them when they are panicky like Jesus did to Martha.

So, I want to close with some more of the scripture, to give clarity to our purpose and our mission as believers: I John 1: 1 That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of life. 2 The life appeared; we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us. 3 We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. 4 We write this to make our joy complete.

And finally, Psalm 133: Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity! 2 It is like the precious ointment upon the head, that ran down upon the beard, even Aaron's beard: that went down to the skirts of his garments; 3 As the dew of Hermon, and as the dew that descended upon the mountains of Zion: for there the Lord commanded the blessing, even life for evermore.

The peace and grace of Christ be with you all.

           

182. American Optimism

There are a zillion characteristics I can think of when I categorize the American people, but the one that strikes me the most is our optimism. I know sometimes that optimism can teeter on the edge of delirium, but in the end, I think being optimistic is the best way to live. I know that many of my European friends view Americans as naïve, not fully aware of the negative aspects of the natural world and the human condition, but I don’t believe that to be the case at all. Certainly, our optimism springs from our very reason of being in this country as immigrants at all. Many of our ancestors and our neighbors came to this country out of desperation and a need to escape unspeakable terrors and while everything here was not hunky dory, they were able to scratch out a life for themselves and their children. They were able to make things better, they came here with hopes and dreams, and many of those things worked for them. So yes, Americans have been born of optimism and they work with that in mind.

It’s not to say that there aren’t plenty of pessimistic Americans, chief among them can be me, but Americans believe in working to attain the positive. In fact, sometimes we tend to believe we are so right about how to do something that we bulldoze over every other idea when maybe we shouldn’t. Right now, our politics are so divided because of this, and we certainly caused some evil wars because of our optimistic belief we were right, so sometimes American optimism can be a negative thing. But what I really appreciate and value about American optimism is that kind of Job aspect of never giving in, never cursing God and dying. That is kind of amazing when all people know that the end result of our individual lives is going to be death. Americans won’t just roll over and accept that. We migrate to new places, we fight for our rights, and we persevere. I am grateful for that.